The Trail of Tears—1838 and Today

by Gabe Schlabach

One hundred and seventy years ago, 17,000 Cherokee men, women, and children made a long and perilous journey from their lands in Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Alabama to “Indian Country” in Oklahoma. They travelled 1,200 miles by foot. Approximately 4,000 died from starvation, exhaustion and disease as they faced the cold of a brutal winter.

This was not a voluntary journey. The Cherokee were forced by U.S. soldiers at gunpoint to relocate, despite an 1838 Supreme Court decision that said the state of Georgia could not force the Cherokees off their land. This unconstitutional relocation, the “Trail of Tears,” which was carried out under the presidencies of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren, was one of the most shameful chapters of United States history.

This 1838 incident was not the first such relocation to be called the Trail of Tears, however. The phrase was first coined to refer to the Choctaw relocation of 1831, and can fittingly refer to all incidents of forced migration of Native Americans. In total, approximately 100,000 Native Americans were forced off their land and pushed west to make way for U.S. expansion and greed, an appalling number that does not even include those killed by bullets or disease.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

In 2005 Congress passed the Real ID Act, which includes an easily overlooked section that allows the Department of Homeland Security to ignore any laws “necessary to ensure expeditious construction” of the fence on the U.S.-Mexico border. This reckless anti-immigrant policy has led to the government seizing Native land on the U.S.-Mexico border.

The U.S. government has long recognized the sovereignty of Native American Tribes. This means that the federal government is obligated to relate to each Native American Nation as one government to another. Ignoring the boundaries of Native land is not only a slap in the face to Native Americans, but it is an unconstitutional reminder of the worst U.S. policies towards them.

And it will have long-term effects. Not only will Native families in the path of the border have to give up the land they have held for generations, but 23 Native tribes will have an ugly and humiliating wall running through their land, making travel to work, to shop, and to visit friends and family much more difficult. Additionally, the fence runs through sacred sites and burial grounds, adding insult to injury.

It is unfortunate that in 2008 the United States government continues to ignore its own laws and continues to infringe upon the rights of Native Americans. It’s past time to call upon the government to treat Native Peoples justly, but that doesn’t make it any less necessary.